The Ultimate Betrayal: The Enabling Mother, Incest and Sexual Abuse

166 Pages·2006·0.59 MB·English

T U
HE LTIMATE
B
ETRAYAL
T E M , I
HE NABLING OTHER NCEST
S A
AND EXUAL BUSE
A R , P D
UDREY ICKER H
SEE SHARPPRESS • TUCSON, ARIZONA
Copyright © 2006 by Audrey Ricker. All rights reserved.
For information contact
See Sharp Press
P.O. Box 1731
Tucson, AZ 85702-1731
Or go to our web site: www.seesharppress.com
Ricker, Audrey.
The ultimate betrayal : the enabling mother, incest and sexual
abuse / by Audrey Ricker. - Tucson, Ariz. : See Sharp Press, 2006.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 1-884365-40-X
1. Incest victims - Case studies. 2. Child abuse - Psychological aspects -
Case studies. 3. Family psychotherapy
616.85836
Cover design by Kay Sather. Interior design by Chaz Bufe.
C
ONTENTS
Introduction (Katherine Trimm) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
A Therapist’s Comment(Ophelia Zamora) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
An Attorney’s Comment (Sue Supp, Atty. at Law) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
ASurvivor’s Poem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
PART 1 — Childhood Trauma
1. How Your Mother Treated You . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Discovering how your mother treated you; Dealing with your
feelings about your treatment; Self-help exercises
2. The Enabling Mother’s Matriarchal Status . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Characteristics of the enabling mother; Case histories;
Self-help exercise
3. The Mother’s Control of the Survivor’s Feelings . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Case histories; Self-help exercise
4. The Survivor’s Loyalty to the Mother . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Case histories
5. The Mother’s Destruction of the Survivor’s Self-Esteem . . . . . 47
Case histories; Self-help exercise
6. The Mother’s Emotional Alienation of the Survivor . . . . . . . . . 55
Case histories; Self-help exercise
7. The Mother’s Scapegoating of the Survivor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Case histories; Self-help exercise
8. Resilience of the Enabling Mother . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Case histories; Self-help exercise
9. The Enabling Mother’s Self-Image as a Good Parent . . . . . . . 69
Case histories; Self-help exercise
10. The Survivor’s Relationship to the Perpetrator’s New
Wives & Girlfriends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Case histories
11. Feeling Better . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Self-help exercises: Dealing with self-hate; Dealing with loneliness;
Dealing with addiction to destructive people;
Dealing with intertia—taking care of necessary business;
Dealing with self-neglect
PART II — Late Adolescent and Adult Trauma
12. The Mother’s Role in Late Adolescent and Adult
Sexual Trauma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Definition of sexual assault; Definition of sexual harassment;
Definition of sexual molestation; Case histories
13. Lessons from the Case Histories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
14. Are You Still Suffering from Your Sexual Assault? . . . . . . . . . 102
PTSD symptoms; Self-help exercises: Love life; Work life;
Mental life; Social life; Relationship with your mother;
Relationship with yourself; Taking care of yourself now
PART III — Present and Future
15. Are You Living with Rape and Incest? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Guilt feelings; Case histories; Getting out
16. Multiple Personalities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
How they come about through trauma; Case histories;
Related problems; Self-help exercise
17. Acting Out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Drug/alcohol abuse; Self-mutilation; Property destruction;
Stealing; Verbal harassment; Case histories
18. When the Victim Becomes a Perpetrator . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Perpetrator tendencies; Need to punish; Stalking; Case histories
19. Guilty Pleasures: When Something Bad Feels Good . . . . . 137
Pleasure from abuse; Your feelings about that pleasure;
Case histories
A Final Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Appendix A: Types of Help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
Support groups; Trauma treatment (EMDR, hypnosis);
Counseling; Nondirective psychotherapy;
Other types of psychotherapy; Psychiatric medications
Appendix B: Recommended Reading & Viewing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
I
NTRODUCTION
The uproar about “stranger danger” and Internet predators diverts atten-
tion from the real child abuse problem: over 80% of child abuse happens
within the family. Statistics tell us that at least one in every six children in
1
our country will be sexually abused before they leave childhood. Yet we
cannot bring ourselves to talk about the parents who directly participate in
or enable the sexual abuse of their own children.
Millions of children are sexually abused by one or more of their own
family members, usually with the knowledge and consent of other family
members. Yet we rarely talk about this. If this were any other problem even
remotely as serious and widespread, it’s certain that we would hear about
it—loudly and repeatedly.
The Ultimate Betrayal opens with what one would hope would be the
normal response by a mother to the abuse of her children: outrage followed
by action against the perpetrator. Unfortunately, this response isn’t the norm.
Enabling behavior is more common—behavior in which the mother ignores
the abuse or even actively aids the perpetrator.
That behavior, and its effects, is the subject of this book; and it’s one of
the last taboos in our culture. This book will likely be shocking and upset-
ting to readers who have only experienced nurturing, caring mothers.
However, this book will provide relief and validation to those who have seen
dysfunctional mothers through their work in the legal system or as thera-
pists—or as the child of an enabling mother.
Whether you work as a prosecutor or counselor, or are an abuse sur-
vivor, we hope that you will find a deeper understanding of the dynamics of
the abusive family through the following:
The role of the mother in child abuse
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) compre-
hensive survey of child maltreatment in 2004 reports that, “Approximately
40 percent of child victims were maltreated solely by their mothers; anoth-
er 17 percent were maltreated solely by their fathers; 19 percent were abused
by both parents, 7 percent were abused by the mother and another person.
2•INTRODUCTION
Other relatives of the child were the perpetrators 5 percent of the time. Child
victims abused by non-familial perpetrators accounted for only 11 percent
of the total.”
While these statistics encompass all forms of child maltreatment, it is
significant that the mother, at 40%, is the predominant source of mistreat-
ment of children. When one includes the 19% of abuse incidents in which
both parents participated, and the 7% in which the mother and another per-
son hurt the child, the amount of abuse in which the mother participated
jumps to 66%. And almost 90% of child maltreatment is caused by a fami-
ly member. In contrast, all non-family members are responsible for only
11% of child maltreatment. Thus, it appears that the leading source of dan-
ger to a child is his or her parents.
While the Department of Health and Human Services report en-com-
passes all kinds of child maltreatment, similar percentages appear in two
smaller studies of child sexual abuse perpetrators. These studies identify
80% of perpetrators as interfamilial, with only 20% of perpetrators coming
from outside the family.2
These studies only refer to direct abuse. If one also considers participa-
tion in enabling activities as abuse, the percentage of parent participation in
child abuse rises even higher.
The correlation between domestic violence
and childhood sexual abuse
“The most significant predictor of whether a battered woman will physical-
ly abuse her child is having been physically abused by her own mother—not
being battered by her partner.”3
“75% of child rape was related to histories of physical abuse.” “Women who
were sexually abused are three times at higher risk for later domestic vio-
lence. . . . Predictors of later domestic violence histories include Child
Sexual Abuse, emotional abuse, alcohol abuse, and a low educational level.
. . . Severity of Child Sexual Abuse is the strongest predictor of later vic-
timization in intimate partner violence.”4
These quotations from studies indicate that domestic violence is a pre-
dictor or precursor of child sexual abuse, and that child sexual abuse is a
precursor or predictor of domestic violence. It’s a chicken-or-the-egg situa-
tion. Whether you are in law enforcement, the judicial system, child welfare,
THEULTIMATEBETRAYAL•3
or family counseling, anecdotal evidence in your field has long suggested
that abuse runs in families and continues through the generations. Now
research supports the validity of those observations. Whether the mother is
the perpetrator of domestic violence, or victim, or both perpetrator and vic-
tim, her role in domestic violence profoundly affects the future of her chil-
dren.
Childhood sexual abuse and the dysfunctional family
“Studies have not found differences in the prevalence of child sexual abuse
among different social classes or races. However, parental inadequacy,
unavailability, conflict and a poor parent-child relationship are among char-
acteristics that distinguish children at risk of being sexually abused.”5
There is no correlation between socio-economic status or race with
childhood sexual abuse. It is family dysfunction that puts children at risk. To
better understand the dynamic of dysfunctional parents and how their par-
enting styles put their children at risk, we turn to the work of Dr. Kalyani
Gopal, researcher, therapist and teacher. In over 25 years of working in the
field of child sexual abuse, Dr. Gopal has developed a model she describes
in her upcoming book, Toxic Parenting Styles.
Here are Dr. Gopal’s four Toxic Parenting Styles6:
1) Guardian-oriented parenting style
• Overindulgence
• Overprotection
• Infantilization
• Hypervilgilance
• Pity
• Excessive concern
• Lack of independence
• Enmeshed relationship with child
• Seen in families with sick children
4•INTRODUCTION
2) Exploitation-oriented parenting style
• Verbal abuse
• Physical abuse
• Neglect
• Emotional abuse
• Dejuvenilization
• Sexual abuse
3) Abuse-oriented parenting style
• Difficulty showing affection to children
• Poor sense of identity
• Overprotective/neglectful
• Insecure, preoccupied, forgetful
• Boundaries struggles
• Passivity, envy of child’s normalcy
• Unrealistic developmental expectations
• Role reversal
• Somatization
• Seen in families with histories of abuse
• Parentified child
4) Victim-oriented parenting style
• Helplessness
• Child becomes the caretaker
• Child fearful of parent hurting/killing self
• Role reversal
• Threatened by child’s need for independence
• Actions of self-injury to keep child in caretaking role
• Whiny, complaining, condescending, cajoling, manipulative style
These descriptions apply to the parents we find in The Ultimate
Betrayal’scase studies. The author argues that dysfunctional parenting facil-
itates, or enables, the abuse perpetrator. Given how closely the parents in the
case studies conform to the above “toxic parenting styles,” this certainly
seems to be the case.